This year’s autumn seminar of the ITI’s medical and pharmaceutical network took place in London and was centered around the topic colorectal surgery. It was presented by Justin Alberts, a general surgery consultant and colorectal surgeon.

The seminar was split up into three sections: two interesting lectures which would inform us about important backgrounds, medical conditions, their development and treatments and a group project.
After a short introduction the morning lecture started: it was a relatively fast build-up that started with basic anatomy and physiology of the colorectal region before we progressed to minor illnesses such as haemorrhoids, anal fistula and rectal prolapse.

We then moved on to our lunch break. The participants enjoyed delicious food and the lunch room was buzzing with conversations. Soon it was time for part two: more serious conditions such as Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis and colorectal cancer, their aetiology and treatments.

Last but not least, we were all separated into our respective language groups to discuss the translations we had prepared for this seminar and to draft glossaries for our respecitve language combinations. While we busied ourselves with the linguistic and medical issues of our texts, Mr Alberts visited each language group to answer any questions we might have. In the end, just before it was time to leave, we even got a quick demonstration of how some of the surgery tools worked that Mr Alberts had brought to the lecture.